Something for Everyone

When you are in school, you get something special around March and April.  It is called spring break.  Since Marcia's swim sessions are through a community college, we get spring break next week.  A whole week without Marcia and without feeling guilty if we sleep in!

During our usual pulling warm-up with pull buoys, Marcia yelled at me, saying, "Ann, make sure you are pulling in straight back, no side to side motion" as she swung her arms across the front of her body.   In freestyle, my arms have a bad habit of entering the water, slanted towards the middle of my body and crossing the front of my body as I pull through.  This sideways motion is a waste of energy since I do not want to swim sideways, but forward.  If you row, think about what some people call "tea bag" rowing where on the drive, instead of pulling in straight and level, your hands go up and then down.  This causes your blade to dig deep into the water and then come back up to the right level, like dunking a tea bag.  You are wasting energy when your oar has vertical motion, instead of horizontal motion through the water. 

Since today was the last swim before spring break, we all lived in fear the night before that Marcia would make us do the 4x100yd swim test.  Not to disappoint, Marcia had something even better for us; she had something for everyone.  There are three swim tests that Marcia makes us do--15 minute swim, 400yds kick with kick board, and 4x100yds free.  Today's workout had a bit of everything, for everyone.  Everything was FAST:

1.  5 minute freestyle swim - take the number of laps from your 15 minutes swim test, divide by three, and add one; that is the number of laps to swim in 5 minutes
2.  200yds flutter kick, with board - take your time from the 400yd kick test and divide by two; you want to kick faster than that time
3.  2x100yds - just FAST.

The 200yd kick ended up being the most brutal with us kicking until our legs felt numb.  Two women in the lane next door, the two other women in my lane, and I all kicked the entire 200yds at the same speed, shoulder to shoulder, like a row of Roman phalanxes, unable to drop anyone.  The "something for everyone" workout was exhausting, but the different mini-tests offered enough variety so that we were not as stressed out as during the 4x100yds swim test.  Plus, Marcia did not haul out her clipboard to record any times. 

If you row, imagine doing a 4x500m erg test or running two laps around the track, running two sets of stairs, and erging 2x500m.  Which would you prefer?  Which would require more mental toughness?  Both are challenging, but in different ways.  The 4x500m focuses on consistent performance; it does not mean much if you pull an amazing split on the first two pieces only to die in the last two.  The run/stairs/erg workout requires more versatility in your muscles and ability to mentally push through fatigue; it is more of a test to see how much speed you can still have after fatiguing your muscles.

Spring break!